"Jan should have had a bigger career. Jan deserved a big movie career. Certainly as big as Rob Schneider's f---ing career. She was a bigger star on 'SNL.'"

Fey, 44, also recalled how she came to cast Hooks as Jenna Maroney's mother.

"We needed to cast Jane Krakowski's estranged Florida dirt bag mother, and I thought, 'My God, do you think we could get Jan Hooks because she's an idol of mine?'" Fey said. "And the answer was like, 'Yeah, you can get her.' She was living in Woodstock. And the phone was not ringing."

"She was actually a little shy about jumping back into the game," Fey continued. "And she came down (to the set) and she was so funny."

Fey then discussed a particular scene from Hooks' 2010 guest appearance, when Jenna and her mother sang a hilarious duet of Captain and Tennille's "Do That to Me One More Time."

"And it was so funny and the crew was so mesmerized," Fey said. "It was all at once the most ridiculous and heartbreaking and beautiful (and) weird mother-daughter relationship," she said. "And I'm so proud of it."